Some Corner of a Foreign Field
by Nuuru
Summary: When Jack Firebrace saved Leftenant Stephen Wraysford.


**Some Corner of a Foreign Field**

By Nuuru

in re. _Birdsong_

i.e. BBC, 2012

* * *

 **Summary** : When Jack Firebrace saves Leftenant Stephen Wraysford.  
 **Rating:** T for war-violence/wounds  
 **Characters:** LT Stephen Wraysford, Jack Firebrace, Isabel Azaire (mentioned)  
 **Tags:** 2012 BBC version, end of episode 1, extension of the final scene

* * *

" _7_ _A thousand may fall at your side  
_ _And ten thousand at your right hand,  
_ _But it shall not approach you.  
_ …  
 _11_ _For He will give His angels charge concerning you,  
_ _To guard you in all your ways.  
_ _12_ _They will bear you up in their hands,  
_ _That you do not strike your foot against a stone."  
_ _Psalm 91: 7, 11-12_

Firebrace walked along the war-torn road flanked by tall spruces and pines and overturned carts and dead horses alike. The sharp green contrasted from the dusty and entrenched front lines he just left and the Regimental Aid Post, and further to the Casualty Clearing Stations, where the medical brigade filtered the dead from the merely wounded. They either buried their lost in a forgotten foreign field of France or sent them on their way home to hopefully survive there. Firebrace prayed Wraysford was a part of the latter.

Not fresh-faced like many of the junior enlisted, or even some of the new leftenants that fought and died day in and day out, Wraysford still stood among those considered young. Not much younger than Firebrace himself, yet he thought the lack of age in Wraysford's face gave way to the idea that Wraysford had joined much younger than he had in reality. Firebrace hoped he had a family somewhere, but the fact that Captain Weir did not know and neither mentioned if his fellow officer ever received so much as a letter or package worried Firebrace all the more. Maybe no one waited at home for Leftenant Wraysford to return, if he had a home to go back to. Maybe, he was alone in the world.

By late afternoon, Firebrace found his way to the ruin building pretending to double as a house of healing. The wounded lay in haphazard rows, stretched over whatever flat surface in some false semblance of order, still, silent, with bandages shoddily applied and others with injuries left to the open air. Firebrace scanned each face. He checked under blankets and coats. When he could not find the young Leftenant, he checked once more.

Everyone though Leftenant Wraysford dead, with the new Brass and all, but Firebrace had hope. An inkling, but still hope.

At the end of his second look-through, still no man resembling Wraysford rested here. Elsewhere then. Through the cracks in the ruins, he looked below to the clearing station's main entourage. The medics had split the area into parts: tents to the left and right, presumably separating the surgeon's and doctor's sleeping quarters from those of the hurt. In the center, an overhang covered what Firebrace assumed where the doctors conducted most of their business. Men lay on stretchers and cots around, smoking, eating, and talking, waiting to be picked up and sent home. Behind all of this a barricade separated the living from the dead. A barren field reached towards the horizon and Firebrace could see the neat lined rows of one dead man after the other.

Firebrace shuffled down the hill. With a quick glance, he saw that none of the men which waited here to leave were Wraysford either. He approached the overhang, looking beneath the metal covering to see what patients the doctors attended, hoping one might be the young officer.

"Who are you? What are you doing in here?"

Firebrace jumped, turning at the harsh voice of an officer barreling towards him.

"Firebrace's the name, Sir. I'm a sapper and I'm lookin' fur an officer by the name of Leftenant Stephen Wraysford. I'm to send news to 'is family with 'is badge."

The medical officer eased, once Firebrace mentioned the lost man's rank. "Wraysford, huh?"

"Aye, Sir."

He waved Firebrace over to a cot where a man lay, hope rising in Firebrace's chest. But the man was not Wraysford either. Instead the officer picked up a stack of papers, rifling through them one by one. Firebrace watched, wondering if the medical man actually read anything on them by how quickly he passed from one page to the next.

"You check up there?" The officer asked, nodding towards the ruin building.

"Twice, Sir." Firebrace said.

The officer sighed, moving to pick up another stack, smaller. Firebrace wished he could read the pages himself, but he dare not touch them, or look too closely. He could not much see in the first place, for the smudges and dirt and distance. The quiet rustle of those telling sheets echoed in his mind, the anticipation of each moment lingering seconds too long.

The medical officer glanced up at Firebrace once or twice, yet he said nothing. He did not ask why an old sapper went about after a young officer. The one to go writing letters or looking to their effects of their likes, only other officers did, especially the higher the rank. Yet war made disorganized chaos and tended to disregard rank when death came calling.

Again, the officer sighed, exhaustion evident in his slouch and the lines on his face. "Wraysford?"

Firebrace nodded, wondering if the man had already forgotten the Leftenant's name.

The man turned, gazing at the ploughed field where the dead awaited their final resting place. He jutted his chin towards there, not saying a word. Firebrace's stomach churned and his heart sank. That meant that the solemn young man, to Firebrace only seemed to be just really grasping at life, had left this world all together. Like a good Christian, he would say a prayer for Wraysford's soul.

"Thank you Sir," Firebrace murmured. That spark of hope extinguished itself. He swallowed hard as he stepped off to the lines of unmoving bodies.

From what he could remember, Wraysford's wound was not fatal: a single gunshot to the upper left chest, the shoulder by all accounts. It struck far enough from the heart to not kill a man. Many had gotten hit there and had stood up once more to fight again. Yet Wraysford went down. Maybe the bullet had hit something vital. All Firebrace knew, that by the time he had dragged Wraysford back to the entrance, the blood coated the Leftenant's left arm down to his hand, dripping with a steady beat to the ground below. A bleeder of a wound. Yet Firebrace would bet a guinea that Wraysford suffered from shell shock before the blood loss took hold. The unresponsiveness? The blank stare? Or was it just pain and the inability to do anything about it, even scream? It had to have been shock…

He knew Wraysford had no desire to go down into the tunnels and climbed below the earth better than most men with that British stiff upper lip. It covered up his superstitions, if only just. Surrounded with only one way to escape in makeshift tunnels sounded like an infantry-man's nightmare. Was a trap, pure and simple. Most got out just fine, yet that did not discount the danger of a sapper's tunnel. Since the Germans shot Wraysford on his first underground foray, maybe the Leftenant had a right to be superstitious.

It was such a loss, Firebrace thought. Not one for clever words and the only ones he could describe Wraysford's death was that this was such a loss. A great loss.

Coming around the barricade, Firebrace saw the series of men spread long. Man after man. Bloated bodies stone cold stiff in their uniforms. Some de-clothed, pale and still in the freezing French air. The bandages left signified those who struggled and those without implied they had died all too quick. Each man's loss echoed ache in Firebrace's heart. He and Wraysford were just getting to know each other, coming to an understanding between sapper and infantryman, between enlisted and officer. He would have been one of those good officers, Firebrace thought, one of those rare ones. Now, such a loss, succumbed to Death's embrace.

Then he saw him.

Wraysford lay at the end of middle row, frozen and silent. Dried blood, dirt, and mud caked his bare chest and covered his plain calm face. He looked so peaceful despite the chapped lips and pale skin. He must have passed on quick, Firebrace thought and stood waiting over this young man's body as he said a quick prayer.

He looked like a boy, almost like Peter Pan, with his hair stuck up at odd angles and the smudges of dirt on his youthful face. Firebrace almost expected a quick grin and a laugh, like his boy at home would do by pretending to sleep only to jump up and run off giggling. Yet Wraysford was a man, no matter how he appeared.

Firebrace knelt, the silent prayer still on his lips. Wraysford wore his tags about his neck with a thin leather cord. Firebrace picked it up, rubbing the grime and blood from it as he lifted it to pull it over Wraysford's head, but he stopped. He heard a whimper? A groan? A breath? A sound of life surely. Firebrace glanced to Wraysford's face. The Leftenant's eyes had opened to slits and shown fever-bright.

A hallucination? The last death throes? Or had Wraysford persisted, still very much alive?

"Hel…" Wraysford whispered almost unheard. "Hel...mmm…"

Firebrace starred, not believing his eyes. The cord dropped from his hand. He near convinced himself that he could do nothing, because Wraysford lay here dead, no dying, no - condemned to die - so assured that these were this young man's last moments.

"Help," Wraysford said stronger. He swallowed as if trying to parch his all too dry throat. Wraysford did not blink as he stared up at Firebrace, even if his eyes barely stayed open. No sign of death's sleep showed itself taking hold, only fever and pain reflected in his earnest eyes with a desperate plea for help to move his weak body. He shuddered, titling his head towards the sapper as he tried once more to speak the word, "Help." All that came were shivers and a single deep breath.

He lived.

That last word resounded loud and clear, striking at Firebrace to move. He knew how wrong he was, how wrong all of this was. Without a second thought, Firebrace leaned forward, reaching under Wraysford's neck and around his shoulders, lifting the young man to sit up.

"Get me up," Wraysford said, again strong and clear.

And Firebrace was. Oh, how he was. He moved quick, but gentle enough not to aggravate Wraysford's wound and whatever pains might have plagued the young Leftenant. Bodies were heavy, even young men, especially with more muscle and bone on tall frames such as Wraysford's. Firebrace snaked his other arm under his knees, pausing to secure his grip.

He could tell Wraysford had more strength left in his tired body, tensing and reaching up with his free arm as if to take his own weight. Firebrace gathered the young leftenant close to him and hefted him up as Firebrace stood, grunted under the load. Wraysford cried out in pain as Firebrace lifted him, jostled so as not to let him slip. Wraysford's arm dropped, his strength all but spent.

Firebrace glanced down as he strode through the men left behind. He could see Wraysford fading back to unconsciousness as his eyes closed and face relaxed.

"Isabel." Wraysford murmured then quieted, his bones slackening.

Firebrace flashed a quick look down again and picked up speed.

"Don't- Don't fall asleep," Firebrace said.

Wraysford did not respond. The faintest of smiled graced his dry lips and Firebrace did not know if this Isabel lived too or died as well. He hoped she lived. Too many men spoke the name of a deceased lover after waking, appearing to heal, only to pass on moments later, as if to follow them into the limelight of death.

"Leftenant, you need to stay awake," Firebrace said. His grip was slipping, despite all his strength gained from digging tunnels. He stopped and lowered Wraysford's feet to the ground so the young man stood supported by Firebrace's chest. He reached over to grasp Wraysford at his neck and the base of his skull, drawing the leftenant's limp head forward. He gave a slight shake in hopes to wake the young man up. Wraysford made no sound, but his breath hitched. His skin felt warm, too warm, but Wraysford had not perished. His chest rose and fell as his eyes flickered beneath their lids, reassuring Firebrace. Just fever dreams.

Firebrace readjusted, swinging his own arm below both of Wraysford's, embracing him near his lower back. Again, he bent and lifted Wraysford by the knees, feeling the young man steady and stable in his arms. Wraysford remained silent as Firebrace picked his way through the shortest route of dead trees, bramble, and brown bush back to the clearing station.

A few corpsmen and medics eyed him as he passed, but no one said a word. Firebrace strode right under the main overhang and found an empty cot. Firebrace made sure to be gentle, slowly lowering Wraysford down from knees to back to head, as if caring for a child. Wraysford, unfortunately, did not stir. His breathing evened out, low, as if Death had taken him once again.

"Hey! What are you doin'?"

Firebrace spun to see a medic, not the same man from before approach them.

"You bring in one of the dead, I hear, simp? 'E's out there for a reason." The medic stopped at the end of the cot, at Wraysford's feet. Firebrace saw that this man also was a leftenant. He spoke odd with something pushed in front of his teeth.

"'E's not dead," Firebrace said.

They both glanced at Wraysford, motionless, eyes stubbornly closed, and breathing so shallow, it appeared nonexistent to their eyes.

"'E's dead." The leftenant said, shifting from foot to foot. "Take 'im back and I won't tell your commanding officer 'e's got one for the loon house."

"I'm not crazy," Firebrace retorted. This was the most he had ever argued against an officer, but Wraysford's life suspended on a thin line between salvation today or death on the horizon. "And Leftenant Wraysford isn't dead. He's got a fever fit to burn."

The leftenant huffed. A clear debate battered around inside the officer's head. He turned and spit a wad of tobacco.

"Right then." The officer walked around the cot to Wraysford's other side. He grabbed the injured leftenant's wrist, checking for a pulse. "See? Cold as the night. Why don't-"

Wraysford pulled his wrist from the medical officer's grasp. He had awoken again, shivers wracking his naked body and his eyes slid open. He gazed straight up at the officer, eyes till bright with heat and pain, but blazed with intensity.

The officer gaped in shock.

Wraysford reached, clutched the officer's coat causing the man to step forward unawares and knock into the cot.

"No," Wraysford whispered. "No. Not dead."

There you go, Firebrace thought. He allowed himself a small smile. Even fading in and out from unconsciousness, Wraysford held his own.

"By God and Queen," the leftenant muttered, his reaction similar to Firebrace's not ten minutes prior. He leaned forward, fingers to Wraysford's neck and the other on his brow. Wraysford continued to shiver, his breaths coming deeper and hitching. Those fever-ridden eyes closed. Firebrace realized that Wraysford must have been waking to waves of pain and heat, only to fade out when one or both ebbed away. The worst had yet to pass and the thought that the young officer still might pass disturbed Firebrace.

The leftenant continued his ministrations, moving to inspect the gunshot wound.

Firebrace hesitated, but let go of discomfort and clasped Wraysford's hand, not caring about the blood-cake skin and his tenuous relationship with the officer. He crouched close to the cot, near eye-level with the wounded young man. Firebrace called that Wraysford might not have a soul in the world and if he was lost in a sea of darkness and agony, for this moment, Firebrace could ground him.

Wraysford returned his grip, a weak squeeze, but still one. He lazily turned his head to look at Firebrace, a quiet thanks written across his face.

"You got to keep 'ur eyes open, leftenant. Don't fall asleep on us now, 'less the good doctor says so," Firebrace said.

He recognized that Wraysford struggled to stay awake, exhaustion evident in the slow blinks, the lack of response, and shivers sapping what little strength remained, but he gripped Firebrace's hand tighter. Another wave of shuddered washed over Wraysford, tempting him to close his eyes and fall asleep once more.

"It's infected, bad," The officer spoke. "Miracle he's alive, awares even."

He glanced between Firebrace and Wraysford. "Keep doin' what you're doin'. No sleeping. I'll be back in a bit."

Without any more explanation, the leftenant strode away. Firebrace watched him go, then returned his attention back to Wraysford. Firebrace gave a small grin, "'ere that? Even doc says so, so no going off to them dreams. Stay awake so you can see that dame of yours, Lady Isabel, you said."

Wraysford's gaze widened at the mention of Isabel's name. Something open and vulnerable existed in the expressions of a wounded man and if Firebrace had not known what little he did about Leftenant Wraysford, he never would have seen it, that look of utter love and longing. Wraysford could never hide it, even before. Despite his knowledge, Wraysford had telling face, open to being read no matter his quiet nature and how he bottled his emotions. Here, all that was tripped away, unguarded. The yearning and loneliness poured from Wraysford's eyes. Maybe it was this long war that severed them, he and Isabel. Maybe she left him, accounting for the lack of letters. Or maybe she had truly died and Firebrace hoped that was not the case.

Wraysford looked as if he wanted to say something, but he sighed instead and swallowed hard against his dry throat.

"When the doc gets back, we'll see if we can get you some water," Firebrace said.

Wraysford swallowed again, "Thank you."

Firebrace nodded. He wasn't sure how to reply. _You're Welcome_ did not seem to be appropriate as if saving a man's life could be whittled down to a common courtesy. He neither liked to joke about such matters, flippantly saying that he could not just leave him out there. Firebrace acted, was all. Saw a man in need. The wrongness and now here they sat. Firebrace guessed he did not have to stay now.

"I…" Firebrace began.

Wraysford's eyes slid from him to something behind Firebrace. He turned to see two medical officers approaching. He recognized both: the leftenant and the man from much before.

"You found 'im then," the medical officer said. Both of the newcomers surrounded Wraysford, one on each side.

"We'll take care of him," the leftenant said, not even looking up at Firebrace. "You can go now."

Firebrace found he did not want to. He glanced between the two doctors, then down at Wraysford. The young leftenant returned his gaze, thinned with pain. Wraysford managed a slight nod and a final squeeze in Firebrace's hand, "Go."

Nothing more remained that Firebrace could do and it was up to Wraysford to keep these doctor-types persuaded not to send him back out to that barren field.

"I'll wait round here then, till I can see your effect in order, Sir, and you're sent off to hospital," Firebrace said then directed his attention to the medical officers. "I'll see to anything he needs before 'e departs."

Maybe Firebrace liked, but he felt he could not just up and leave. Some might say he was no nurse, so why stay? Firebrace felt he owed it to Wraysford to see him off proper.

"Very well, I'm Capitan Simon," the first officer said. "And this is Leftenant Hannigan. We'll have a medic fetch you for any needs."

Firebrace nodded. He patted his and Wraysford's clasped hand. "Till later then, Sir."

He slipped away. Firebrace did not go far. He climbed back up the hill, finding a spot to rest in the shade of the ruined building. From there, he could watch as Captain Simon and Leftenant Hannigan attended to Wraysford. He prayed to God the young officer endured and the officers did not send him back to those forsaken rows of corpses. He did not know why. He just knew Leftenant Stephen Wraysford had to live.

* * *

The warmth of Firebrace's hand lingered in the cold French air. He tried to open his eyes more, but the effort exhausted him. He wanted to give into the fog and fever dreams of Isabel. She left him. After everything, she left him and he had no idea why. The hope of one day seeing her again kept his heart beating, yet with every thought of her and losing her, bits of himself died too. He wanted to live, but he did not know how to anymore. Not without her.

"Leftenant?" A voice called above him.

His eyes wandered open, still barely slits, but yes, he was awake and somehow aware. Despite this, all he could manage was, "Hmmm?"

"Looks like whoever treated you didn't finish the job. This is going to hurt. We gotta clean the wound 'gain, get the infection out," said the one he recognized as the other leftenant. Leftenant Han - Han-? Han-something or other.

Stephen took a deep breath, trying to ready himself for the pain. Oh God, how he wanted this to end so he could simply go back to sleep and sleep for twenty days or more at a time. No strength prevailed in his weary bones and dehydrated lips. He murmured, "Just get it over with."

So I can get back to the front, he wanted to add, but the cold caught in his throat, making him cough.

"Like a true soldier," Han-something laughed.

How could this doctor be so jovial in the face of so much pain? If he could sit up and slap this man, he would. Stephen settled for closing his eyes.

"- Dakin solution?"

"Over there."

The voices of the two officer ebbed away only to rouse him once more. He felt a cool liquid pour over his wound and Stephen's eyes flew open, the sting on his infected and heated skin prickled all over his shoulder and down his left arm.

He grunted, unconsciously trying to sit up and remove his person away from that foul potion. Captain Simon pushed him back with ease, a single finger held Stephen down. He felt so weak.

"There you are," Captain Simon said. "The burn will pass and your shoulder will start to feel nice and numb for a bit. It'll help ease the pain that is coming when we clear out that wound of yours. No breathe. Good. Good. There you go."

Stephen had not realized he was holding is breath. He took in lungfuls of air as the pain tapered off. His left side bristled with tiny pinches and tingles as all feeling receded into numbness. The ordeal certainly woke him and Stephen felt what pain lingered become a dull ache. All thoughts of floating away to a dreamless sleep departed. Then he smelled chloroform. He recalled that it was used as both an anesthetic and a sedative when he watched the medics out in the trenches.

Captain Simon spoke to him, but Stephen was not paying attention. A spoon hovered above his face with clear liquid. Water? They lifted his head and he swallowed. Not water, but morphine. Whatever shivers he had, pain down to his toes, the buzzing in his head dissolved. It might have not been much, but after however long lying with the dead, he felt that all this numbness was pure bliss.

He had forgotten both Captain Simon and Leftenant Han-something said more torment was yet to come. What was to come but the absolute dark?

The ache hit slow. First, like a stab with a knife to his shoulder, only to realize how literal that was. It dug and dug and dug and dug and kept digging, sending Stephen rolling backwards through his memories back down into the earth with the sappers and the sounds of shovels shift and pour, strike and crunch the blood-stained dirt. The agony hurt so much Stephen believed whatever caused this much torture would tear straight through him to his backside. The gunshot itself he thought better than this for his continuous burn superseded all his senses. He groaned, lulling his head to the side to spy what these officers had concocted to do to his sore shoulder, but he could not see for the blinding white pain streaking through his vision.

"Hold him!" someone hissed. "Make him look the other way."

Stephen gasped as something particularly sharp brushed a tender nerve. A weight bore down over his good side and Stephen glimpsed Firebrace through the haze. He had returned. A second wave strained his already shot nerves, threatening to consume him and between that and the blaze of his fever rolling, rolling, rolling over his mind, Stephen sunk into darkness.

* * *

"What degree?"

"Eh, let's say two."

"Not three? Could've sworn this one was a goner."

"Didn't ye hear? Came back from the dead, this one, straight out of the field of corpses. He's a fighter. If he died, he can die in hospital."

"That's if they get here tomorrow. We'll have to reevaluate then anyway."

Two. The number stuck in Stephen's mind amidst the muddled voices hovering above him. Degrees. A drone like the unhesitant voice of a radio operator echoed in his head:

\- Degree One: Wounded soldiers that require minimal care before returning to the front lines.  
\- Degree Two: More seriously wounded soldiers that are in need of hospital attention.  
\- Degree Three: Soldiers expected to not live despite medical treatment.

Triage categorized soldiers into this three-part system. They listed him as two and not three? Stephen's mind lapsed at the thought of those singular numbers, not connected it with his broken body. He assumed "not" was important. His mind burned hot. Too much to ponder. The thought of waking fell away again into the dark.

* * *

Stephen woke. He did not know where he lay, just that darkness surrounded him, a pitch black darkness. His body had been moved from outdoors as he felt no cold or wind upon his face. He wanted to get up and walk about, find out where they laid his ill body, but heaviness weighed his head down, making it too much to life. The fever had not abated, his bones cracking and a fire smoldered just beneath is skin, wrapping his head in swathes of cloth and fog. Time passed, he assumed. Maybe it hadn't. He swallowed against his still parched throat.

He tried to say, "Water? Is there any water?" But all that came out was a moan.

"Leftenant?"

He swallowed again, this time succeeding, "Water?"

Why was it so dark? Was it the dead of night? Oh, how thirst plagued him.

"I got you," the voice said.

Stephen felt a hand at the base of his skull, lifting up, and the edge of a cup at his lips. Cool water poured in. Pure sweetness. He reached over to grasp whatever cup the disembodied voice held, eager for more.

"Careful. Don't guzzle it. Doc says you'll make yourself sick."

Stephen paused. He looked in the direction of the voice, realizing he had not even opened his eyes yet. "Firebrace?"

"Here, Sir."

The sapper sat next to his cot. Stephen laid his head back down onto the pillow, sighing in relief. "Thank you."

"'Is what I'm here for." Firebrace replied.

Stephen focused his lungs, feeling the air move in and out of is chest. He supposed Firebrace's presence made sense. It didn't, but he was grateful for the company anyway. A single lantern hung low from the tent's ceiling, casting the inside with a dull orange glow. Glancing at the entrance, Stephen saw that night had indeed fallen.

"Why are you here, Firebrace?" He asked.

Firebrace did not respond right away. Confusion crossed his features as if to say he had already answered that. He was a simple man - not dumb, not clever with words either, but honest and good. Stephen recalled how Firebrace did not even try to hide the fact he had fallen asleep on sentry duty. Most men would life. Firebrace told the truth.

"I'm here, Sir, 'cause I said I would stay till you went off to hospital. Thems say it'll take more 'n a month to heal from your wound, 'specially with the infection and all. Cap'an Simon said it were a good idea too, seeing as you, no disrespect, Sir, have, whats'it the words he used?"

Stephen stared at the man. That had to have been the longest Firebrace ever spoke at once. Then again, Firebrace quieted in the presence of officers, showing the utmost respect. This explanation revealed to Leftenant Wraysford how Sapper Firebrace reported. If reported as they danced, Firebrace was all elbows and left feet.

"'E said you have a propensity to sleep as soundless and inert that Death 'isself would not have remembered he had yet to guide you to Heaven, thinkin' he'd already done so. Leftenant Hannigan said it more simply, that you are a corpse when asleep. I mean no insolence, Sir. So thems thought I best watch and see if -" Firebrace cut himself off.

"If I die," Stephen finished.

Firebrace turned his eyes to the ground. He seemed ashamed.

Stephen felt the pull of sleep sweep over him, followed by more shivers. If he could but shake off the fever. He took a deep breath, calming his over-inflamed nerves.

"You're a good man, Firebrace. I trust you not to fall asleep on your watch." He said, quiet and soft against the night.

"Yes, Sir."

He had no intention to make a jab, yet maybe there, in the corner of his heart, anger resided for the whole situation. Firebrace's role, and his pain. He directed that wrath at the man next to him. It wasn't fair. He just did not have the wherewithal to care at the moment. On second thought, maybe he did. Firebrace helped him when the corpsmen had condemned him to die. Out of all the people in his company, Firebrace, a man he sat at odd with, infantry-man verses tunneler, had rescued him.

Stephen glanced over at Firebrace who sat wringing his hands. Looking up took more effort than he thought it would.

"I mean no ill will," he murmured.

Firebrace jumped, "Sir?"

Stephen leaned back into the cot, the small pillow a simple comfort to his aching head. He whispered, "I do trust you."

Sleep grabbed him then, pulling him down to the dark murky depths of numb limbs, dull aches, and his never-ceasing shivers. Somehow, it was still restful. Before the blackness took hold, he heard a quiet sigh with the hint of a smile, "Yes, Sir."

* * *

He dreamed of Isabel. He dreamed of dancing with her in their home. Of their soft conversations and warm bodies cuddling close to the hearth's open fire. Of watching her in the rose garden, softly singing. Of her totally and completely. His heart ached with a furious longing.

His dreams turned dark, to nightmares. Again, and again his mind revisited finding their home empty, only to conjure images why she had yet to return: a thief in the night, knife in hand and a wicked grin; saying she never loved him, just a fling, so she retreated back to her former husband; a carriage ride derailing into a ditch or worse, off a cliff, wounding her fatally. Or so left to wander the wilderness, far from civilization, maybe still wandering only to be taken by a wild animal in the night.

His skin blazed. Stephen sought relief, yet none came. He had to save her, find her… but where had she gone? Who had taken her from him?

"Leftenant? "Leftenant? Sir!" A voice murmured in the background of his mind. He pushed it aside. He must find Isabel.

"Isabel…"

"I expected - happen. This - help. It's -"

"- higher. Keep - cool."

"Aye, Sir."

The voices retreated. Stephen sunk back as cool water poured over him.

"Isabel…"

He thought only of her name as he floated in some dark blank-space where only he and she existed. Nothing could touch them. Or so he naively believed.

Hell's fire scorched the black walls to a sooty-grey. It's heat warmed and cook and he felt like these fires meant to boil him in hit oil. But Isabel! She remained unchanged, unaffected by the flames. He reached out to her, but her being disintegrated to dust. She could not be gone.

He turned this way and that, his vision swimming into focus. He stood in no-man's land. He stood, gazing at the German front and she stood with him.

"Get out of here!" He hissed. "You'll die!"

She smiled as artillery fire and mortars rained hellfire from the skin. Debris and dirt mushroomed into a cloud around her. Stephen crouched, surprised the shells had no effects on his person. He blinked, peering up in fear to where Isabel stood. She had not moved. His breath seized in his chest at the sight of her: white dress splattered red with blood, her side and torso torn open, revealing ribs and heart still beating. Like Douglas, he thought.

He hesitated, stepping towards her.

"Oh Isabel…" He stopped in front of her, unsure of where to put his hand to staunch the bleeding. He tore his eyes from her body to her wondrous blues. They locked gazes. Unperturbed by her own injuries, Isabel cupped a hand to his cheek. She smiled, but dropped both hand and look. Her smiled faded into a frown, eyes pained with hurt and grief.

"Isabel, what's wrong?" He spoke with hushed tones.

She turned away, walking further into no-man's land. Stephen reached for her, but her wrist ghosted through his hand. "Don't go. Where are you going?"

He back stayed towards him. Stephen realized he could no longer see either the German nor English fronts. They were truly alone, yet she receded further and further from his grasp, gliding off into the fog of war.

Stephen tried to run after her only to find his feet caught beneath a pile of stones. Ogling between Isabel so distant and his trappings, he screamed once more, "ISABEL!"

The sound made him sink, as if the very earth sought to silence him.

"Isabel!" He could not be parted from her any longer, yet the ground again pulled him under and swallowed him whole. Stephen lost sight of Isabel as the earth encompassed his being. Pitch blackness enveloped him, crushing his limbs to his body in unwelcome restraints. He quieted, wishing to weep, but finding still his body lacked the strength to do so. Only after a time Stephen felt no more heat under his skin. It had gone, along with all joy.

Stephen then wept. He wept for Isabel. For the war. For his home. He cried, glad of the soft cool dirt that held him fast like something akin to an embrace. He lay like that for however long, he did not know.

A rough hand rest on his brow. Some vague notion told Stephen that this hand belonged to Firebrace.

"Fever's broken," Firebrace murmured. "Lookin' much better, 'e is."

"Good," another voice followed. "He'll be on the next transport then."

"'Ow long might that be, if you don't mind me askin', Sir?"

"Maybe an hour, maybe six, but sometime today."

The crunch of boots on dusty ground signified someone left. Stephen felt his senses returning to him, one by one, weak, but enough to recognize the one who left was Captain Simon.

"Wish you were awake to 'ear that, Sir. You'll be getting out of 'ere, sometime today. 'N I might as well confess it not 'fore them doctors send me off." He sighed, took a small break, and huffed. "I admit me own misconduct, Sir. Seems I've learned nothing while on watch. I fell asleep again. I ashamed to admit it."

Firebrace paused, then sighed once more. To what use did one get out of confessing to an unconscious man? Stephen near wanted to laugh, but exhausting kept him from even opening his eyes. A part of him felt relieved Firebrace fell asleep, as if on watch of his ill body, the sapper has some private showing to his fever dreams. Dreams too intimate to share with anyone except her. He'd trust her with all his deepest thoughts.

As if some rare vigor gave Stephen life, he looked p, eyes blinking open to cool sunlight that filtered through the tent's open door.

"You're too honest a man, Firebrace," Stephen muttered. "Thank you."

Firebrace's breath hitched and Stephen almost thought he heard the man's heart stop, so caught off guard. He said nothing in reply and Stephen didn't mind. He felt himself retreat back into the darkness, this time to a dreamless landscape.

* * *

Stephen did not know how long later he woke to his body being ferried away from the tents of the clearing station. Men, cleaner than he had seen anywhere in all these last months out in the trenches, carried him on a stretched to an awaiting vehicle. They stopped in front of Leftenant Hannigan. He grabbed a few rumpled papers, shoved them in a folder, and lay them on his chest. He grabbed what appeared to be a luggage tag, scribbled something on it, then tied it around Stephen's wrist. Hannigan smiled at seeing Stephen awake. He patted his arm, careful of the bad shoulder and said, "God be with you, you crazy man, Sir. You're a real Lazarus."

Hannigan signaled for the porters to continue carrying Stephen off where they unloaded him into the back of a vehicle. Stephen thought he oddly could not agree with the other leftenant. He felt degraded by this war, but most of all, he felt dead inside still. For how could he live without Isabel? He had thought he'd let her go, but these past fever dreams brought her being, he warmth, her everything back into his full presence of mind.

There, in the furthest reaches of his heart still burned the fires of hope to see her once again, hold her, and take her home with him. Yes, hope spark there, even if just a little.

* * *

" _And He came and found them sleeping,  
_ _and said to Peter, 'Simon, are you asleep?  
_ _Could you not keep watch for one hour?"...  
_ " _Keep watching and praying that you may  
n_ _ot come into temptation, the spirit is willing,  
_ _but the flesh is weak.'"  
_ _Mark 19: 33, 38b_

FIN.


End file.
